puppy love
by itsallanoxymoron
Summary: "I love you." "Keep telling yourself that." ;jadebeckcat au; or, we were young and terribly naive. / on hiatus.
1. Beginings

**puppy love**

**or,, we were young and terribly naive**

**beckjadebeckcat**

**au ; in which universes are two**

* * *

><p><strong>UnIvErSe OnE<strong>

She rests her head on his shoulder, hand in his. "I love you," Beckett Oliver says.

"You shouldn't," whispers Jadelyn West back.

"Too bad you're stuck with me then, huh?" he says, and she would scowl if she wasn't already kissing him, her lips otherwise occupied.

"Too bad."

.

"I love you," he whispers sweetly. "I love you. I love you. I love you." He's repeating it like a prayer - or maybe a curse - over and over.

_Shut up_, she wants to say. _Shut up before I make you. _But she doesn't. She does not understand this boy, who he is or what he is. They have been "dating" - what an obscene word which does not describe anything - for not even a week. Yet he loves her.

_(He loves me. He loves me not.)_

She doesn't say it back.

.

"Tell me you love me," she demands. He does. She knows he will.

"I love you."

"Keep telling yourself that," she answers.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"You're smart; I'm sure you can figure it out."

.

He brings her coffee one day. She, like she does any other day, scowls at the cup. "This isn't Skybucks," she says sharply. "Buying me crappy brands of coffee, are we, Beckett?"

"I'll be back," he promises, taking her cup away and whisking away the imperfections with magic.

"Don't forget the whip," she says quietly.

He hears her.

.

He walks into her life bringing order and perfection.

She stomps into his leaving chaos and disorder.

.

This is a world where the ice queen loses herself, the dashing prince refuses fire for something much different, and the damsel is distressed is forgotten in shadows.

* * *

><p><strong>UnIvErSe TwO<strong>

_Hey, you_, Caterina Valentine says brightly._ I brought you a cupcake_. The perfect white icing contrasts with the red (_red_red**bloodred**) velvet.

_Thanks._ Beckett Oliver wraps an arm around her (_his_girlhisgirl**hisfreakinggirl**) and kisses the top of her head._ It reminds me of you._

_That's why I bought it for you, silly._

He sticks his pinky in the icing as if to taste it, but instead plops the stuff onto her nose. _Gotcha._

She giggles, and he whirls her around in the air - just them; just them in a **lonesome, lonesome world**.

The boy sees brown hair and a scowl, but thinks nothing of it.

.

_It's just us_, he says.

_Just us in our perfect little world?_ she asks.

_Sure._

.

This, now dears, this is the world in which nothing is as it seems. Innocence is anything but, and royalty cracks under broken facades. Nothing is (_perfect_perfect**perfect**) here.

.

**To Be CoNtInUeD**


	2. uNiVeRsE oNe

**puppy love**

**or, we were young and terribly naive**

**beckjadebeckcat**

**au ; in which universes are two**

* * *

><p><strong>UnIvErSe OnE - pArT oNe<strong>

The first month anniversary of Beckett Oliver and Jadelyn West is on a Friday. He buys her a teddy bear and she wants to cut it up. "Seriously?" she says. "You're going to have to do better than that, Beckett."

And he - always persistent; always perfect - says, "Okay." He pulls out a pair of scissors. "Here you go, baby."

She grins wickedly, and off an ear goes.

.

It is raining. The sky opens up - with no warning - and pours. It pours and pours and pours and perhaps the droplets feel like acid to her skin.

"If you kiss me, I'm going to punch the cliche out of you, Beckett," she promises.

He holds his hands up in mock apology. "Okay," he says. "But I thought the cliche was _dancing in the rain_, Jadely?"

"Don't call me that. And does it look like I care?" She scowls and he laughs.

.

At the one year mark, the pair almost breaks up. She is still the ice queen but he is no longer a dashing prince. "I love you," he says - desperate; trying to hold on to strings that are all too willing to be cut.

"Just cut it out, okay? You shouldn't love me anymore, dammit! You never should have loved me in the first place! Just . . . leave, alright?"

The door slams a little harder than normal, and they both flinch.

.

Caterina Valentine opens the door and sees a lost boy. She says _come in_ so quietly he almost doesn't hear it.

He kisses her - and it might be an accident but does it really matter? We're all broken, anyways.

.

Jadelyn West takes a pair of scissors, and cuts away her heart.

.

"You should go back to her," Caterina Valentine says, if only to herself. She is curled up on her couch, staring at the floor.

"But you don't want me to, Cat," he answers.

She stares at him, her eyes saying _i know _and her lips saying, "Does it really matter?"

"She's set her sights on me, Cat. And when she wants something, she doesn't let go. You know that."

They both sit in silence, the name of a girl on both of their lips.

.

They don't encounter any more roadbumps - after that.

.

During their senior year, he proposes. She says, "Not now, idiot." Beckett Oliver takes it as a, _wait a few years, baby_.

But things change over the course of time.

* * *

><p>They become everything they wanted to be - famous; shining; simply <em>known<em>. It doesn't feel like enough to Jadelyn West but to him, well, he feels too full.

.

"Marry me." Two words. Seven letters. A verb and a noun - in that order.

"No." One word. Two letters. An adjective; adverb; noun; verb.

Three words. Nine letters. A change in everything.

* * *

><p>In this world, there is a boy - a man; a prince; not yet a king - who regrets. There is a queen who is ice - she is not filled up. They are together - they are happy.<p>

This. Is. Life.


End file.
